Truly the "holding breath" chapter of the game, and probably the most intensely political that Kiseki will ever get. Randy finally joins back with us and it's great to have him back. Which brings me to my next point; I don't think I really like Wazy and Noel as SSS characters. Wazy joining makes sense later on with the sidequest where he states that he's setting out on a new path, but it still doesn't seem to jive with the SSS atmosphere. Noel is just... there, not doing much other than being an upright military person. Since Zero built up all the original SSS, it feels really like I'm not controlling the SSS with Wazy and Noel there, like some bootleg sidequest group. Lloyd does say in Zero that he can't imagine an SSS without Tio in it, and I agree; I can't imagine the SSS without Tio in it either! This also kind of ties into my complaint that the sort of rapport, dialogue and sequencing from Zero seems to be missing in a lot of places. Now that I have the original crew back together I expect to get back on the same emotional track that Zero had going.
Battle System: I had to really give it some thought for MQ assignment as more come into play. In the end I decided; Wing on Lloyd, Force on Randy, Crow on Ellie and then after I booted Noel out of the party I put the ATS-buffing one on Tio. Tio luckily received ZERO nerfs to her battle crafts (with a buff to Beam Saber lowering ADF), and with her better ATS and EP pool is actually stronger as a character.
So much happened in this chapter, where to start... well, off the top of my head, the soldiers we fought against in that training exercise were incredibly strong and brought back my favorite style (2-person battles). Almost died around 6 times because of deathblows but managed to keep going and take them down (actually forced me to really dig into my item pool). Thank god I picked Ellie for support. Surprised that these two throwaway characters had full battle animations.
If you do the sidequest about the Gnosis drug study, more revelations are revealed about it. This part was tricky with limited knowledge of Japanese and such; try as I might I couldn't understand the full breadth of what the doctor was saying. On the other quests, the Heiyue guys are such assholes but it's funny to give a tour to a stereotypical rich kid from a different culture. You track down diplomats, investigate train cars, deal with Bleublanc's shenanigans... really a full fledged experience and one of the longest Kiseki chapters I've played so far, maybe beating Zeiss in SC. Oh, almost forgot the Moon Temple investigation; I'm surprised this was relegated to a sidequest, because Ries reveals her identity and an artifact and we learn more about the strange bells. I love how Ries is like "fuck your barrier" and just jumps over, right in front of cops no less! Then we debate whether we should break the law too lol.
Politics. So the Trade Conference finally takes place. Really interesting political moments. Osborne wants a disarmament of Crossbell's gates (removal of their garrisons) in exchange for a trade deal with Crossbell. President Rocksmith agrees but he wants the Republic to control the gate closest to him (Tengram Gate) while the Empire can have the other. Crossbell is in a tough position. Then the terrorists attack; as a united front of both terrorist groups from both countries! I wasn't expecting that. Then it was revealed in the end that the terrorist attack was anticipated by both the Empire and the Republic and that they used their own forces (under proper Crossbell law) to dispose and capture the terrorists, using them as a political pawn to try to shine Crossbell military security in a weak light (and not only that, but with all but one of the terrorists dead or captured, the truth behind their manipulation is likely forever hidden). Pretty incredible, but then Dieter decides to flip the whole table over and declare independence for Crossbell! Finally bringing that CS1 flashback to light.
Can't forget the conversations between Osborne and Rocksmith. Both of these guys are quite the power players. Osborne talked heavily about strength of will and how a nation cannot exist without it and the conversation between him and the SSS was much longer than the one with Rocksmith. Immigration politics and immigration culture clashes are likely going to be the keystone of the story in Calvard, and I look forward to it.
I'm not sure why Campanella assisted the terrorists by breaking into the security systems at Orchis Tower. I'm just not seeing Ouroboros long-term play here. Probably doesn't help that I don't know if this game even has an Anguis in it. Our redheads and their brutality has of course not gone unnoticed; I think that might be the biggest mass murder and bloodiest scene in this series so far. Randy really does not approve of the killing, based on regrets in his past, but I don't think you're gonna reach this crazy family of yours. Zhao and his Heiyue buddies go about the situation a lot more elegantly, but the little meetup with the Hunting Squadron at the base of Orchis Tower was still pretty spooky. Looks like they're not going to get in each other's way... for now.
Oh on the topic of Campanella, I enjoy this bootleg Puyo Puyo game "Pom!" lol. When I first played it I kept trying to rotate the pieces horizontally but it wouldn't let me. After I figured out how the game worked I kicked everyone's ass at it. Campanella went down like a house of cards; hold these S-Crafts. Too bad about Jonah's base getting blown up though. I still don't know where Jonah is! At least the hacking animation battle got fully animated this time and not just stop scenes; made me want to rewatch Hackers.
May I mention that it's getting slightly annoying when all of the major players in the game mysteriously know all of our movements and all of our plans? I get that's what intelligence networks do, but foreign intelligence is probably not going to know my movements in such a fine detail when operating in a foreign country. I find it pretty insane that they knew the terrorists would go after the base of Orchis Tower, where they would run, that I visited the Arseille, SSS reorganization... like, come on. lol
